I apologize for the lack of an update yesterday, I needed to take a sick day. I appreciate all the angry emails. I really do.

The Patriots return from their break today to begin preparation in earnest for the huge game with the New York Jets on Monday night. Even if Tony Massarotti doesn’t know the first thing about the NFL tiebreakers, even he knows this is a huge game for the Patriots.

If you see Patriots Football Weekly on the newsstands this week, be sure to pick up a copy and check out my media column for the month, entitled For Pats, Nantz and Simms part of the family.

The column is a look at how CBS announcers Jim Nantz and Phil Simms have become almost the “official” TV broadcast team of the New England Patriots. No duo since 2000 has called more Patriots games, and no analyst has covered the Patriots more in franchise history – tomorrow will be the 82nd Patriots game that Phil Simms has done on network television – 62 since the year 2000. Nantz will call his 42nd Patriots game since 2000 tomorrow.

The column also looks at some other interesting Patriots broadcast tidbits over the decades, such as who is second on the list of announcers who have called the most Patriots games on network televsion? What was the worst decade for announcers? Who were some of the names who called only one Patriots game in their career? What year did Al Michaels call his first Patriots game?

The data for this column was compiled largely by the crew on the forum at The506.com and in particular, a 24-year Patriots season ticket holder.

The news that Victor Martinez would be signing with the Detroit Tigers set off Red Sox everywhere yesterday, as suddenly they wanted to call into sports radio and vent about the lack of action by Theo Epstein and company this offseason. Both sports radio stations took calls from frustrated fans, many of whom are of the opinion that the Red Sox are not interested in competing or winning in 2011, are too in love with their prospects, and that the ownership is too distracted with their shiny new English soccer team to pay attention to the baseball team.

While I can empathize with the frustrations of fans, part of it reminds me of the cry this Patriots offseason, prior to the draft that “They have no tight ends!!!!” Sometimes you need to wait things out before making a judgement on a club’s decisions. If the Red Sox lose Martinez and Adrian Beltre this offseason (which is expected) but pick up Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez, fans might feel different.

The Patriots victory over the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday garnered the third highest regular season ratings in franchise history, with a 42.04 household rating (67 share) in the Boston market. Over one million people tuned in to WBZ to watch New England improve to 8-2 on the season.

The Patriots-Colts game was the highest-rated game of the season in the local market and the third-highest all time, surpassed by New England’s Dec. 29, 2007 win over the New York Giants that completed the only 16-0 regular season in NFL history and a Dec. 7, 2003 victory over the Dolphins. The Dec. 29, 2007 Patriots-Giants game earned a 50.1 HH rating in the Boston market, a rating that represents an unprecedented four-way telecast in which the game was seen in Boston on NFL Network, WBZ-TV Channel 4 (CBS), WCVB-TV Channel 5 (ABC) and WHDH-TV Channel 7 (NBC).

Coming off back-to-back losses, and playing on the second night of a back-to-back against a team that swept them in the regular season last year, and has given them fits for the last three years, you might think that the Boston Celtics were in for a tough night down in Atlanta.

Instead, the Celtics were the aggressors, pounding the Hawks 99-76, in a game that wasn’t even as close as the score would indicate.

Celtics: Perfect storm – Julian Benbow has a ticked-off Celtics team taking out their frustrations on the Hawks.

Count Brady as ticked off – Monique Walker’s notebook has Tom Brady upset at the Colts defensive line. The Herald notebook from Ian R. Rapoport looks at the challenges the short week poses. The Patriots Journal from Brian MacPherson examines the impact that Logan Mankins has made in his return.

The difference between the 2009 Patriots and 2010 Patriots was again clearly on display yesterday. While last year’s club simply could not close out games, this year’s version has shown the ability to make that one big play and hold on for the win.

Yesterday, it seemed like a complete repeat of last season’s Patriots/Colts game, as New England held a 31-14 fourth quarter lead, only to seem Peyton Manning lead two touchdown drives to pull to within 3 at 31-28. Then, with the Colts already in range of a tying field goal, Peyton Manning was picked off by James Sanders with 37 seconds left to end the Indianapolis drive, and the game. Afterward, Manning said that this game felt more like this game instead of last season’s game, probably because of the end result.

A lot of people will be talking about the Patriots defense, which as noted by CBS yesterday is statistically the worst in franchise history in many categories, but they picked off Manning three times yesterday, the last of which sealed the game. They did just enough.

Precise offense a sight to behold – Greg A Bedard says that if you get past the final 10 minutes of yesterday’s game, you’ll see that the Patriots offense has been dominant in the last two games. Michael Felger would’ve blamed the offense if the Patriots had lost this game.

Patriots keep on winning – Tim Weisberg says that it’s getting harder and harder to come up with grand explanations as to why the 8-2 New England Patriots just keep on winning.

Where have we seen these Pats before? – Rich Levine says that while there comparisons to 2001 here, (polarizing midseason decision, lack of star power, unproven defense) this is a different situation because of history.

Woodhead shows versatility – Monique Walker’s notebook has the diminutive back with another big outing. The Herald notebook from Ian R. Rapoport has more on Sanders’ pick. The ProJo notebook has Dan Connolly making big plays in the running game. The two-minute drill from Hector Longo covers a lot of ground, including the obligatory Jerod Mayo-bashing. The notebook from Glen Farley has more on Woodhead, while the Sun Chronicle notebook from Peter Gobis leads with the secondary play. The Herald has the best and worst from yesterday.

Here is Peter King’s follow up this morning to his Friday item about the Colts thinking that the Gillette locker room was bugged:

I think, just to make it clear from my Friday item on Peyton Manning and Tom Moore holding substantive conversations outside the locker room the last time they played in Foxboro, I don’t believe there’s any way the Gillette Stadium locker room was bugged. I just think in this hugely intense rivalry, the paranoia antennae are raised pretty high whenever they play.

I think, because he felt the need to clarify today, it means he realizes he was dumb to include it in the first place.

I’ve always heard, reliably, that the Colts never trusted that they were totally alone in the Colts’ locker room in Foxboro, and that when Manning had something of strategic significance to say to offensive coordinator Tom Moore, they both stepped outside into the concourse outside the locker room. So if you’re outside the locker room Sunday, don’t be surprised to see Manning and his first-year coordinator, Christensen, huddling for a few minutes.

To me, this isn’t all that different from John Tomase saying that he was told, reliably, that the Patriots taped the Rams walkthrough prior to Super Bowl XXXVI.

Peter thinks Bill Belichick won’t speak to him because of this (Tweeted earlier this week):

April 9th, 2010 might have been the low point of the Celtics season. On that night, the Washington Wizards came into the TD Garden and waxed the Celtics 106-96. In that game, Wizards forward Andray Blatche scored 31 points while embarrassing Kevin Garnett and making him look very bad.

That night might’ve been on the Celtics minds heading into last night, as Garnett and the Celtics extracted revenge with a 114-83 waxing of the Wizards. Blatche was limited to 10 points, while KG scored 18 points in 23 minutes.